Jan 27 2008
Yowie, Sasquatch of the South
The Yowie is an unidentified hominid reputed to lurk in the Australian bush. He is said to be a large, gorilla-like creature over seven foot tall and covered with thick dark brown hair.
Yowies reputedly live in remote mountainous or thickly-forested areas of South Eastern Australia. Reports have continued from the 19th century to the present day, and well over 3000 reports of a huge, hairy, ape like creature with very big feet have been lodged.
The Yowie is very similar to Bigfoot, or the Sasquatch, a cousin of the Himalayan Yeti, but sightings of the Australian creature have been reported from 1881 to 1997, well before any reports of the Abominable Snowman of the Himalayas.
The New Zealand Yowie
The Moehau State Forest is a conservation zone, the only part of mainland New Zealand with a wilderness area of forest extending from the sub-artic montane at the top of Moehau to the sub-tropical waters of the Hauraki Gulf. Much of the highlands is a shallow swampy basin, above the tree-line, frequently covered in mist and overflowing to a 200m high waterfall that feeds the Okahutahi Steam at Big Sandy Bay.
In this broadleaf forest, with good stands of regenerating Kauri & Rimu, hides the elusive New Zealand Yowie.
Bunyip?
In Australia the Yowie has been spotted in rainforests, appearing from behind the giant tree- ferns, and in the arid scrub country. Some travellers have met Yowies near the chilly pools at the bottom of a waterfall, and some have reported a sighting along riverbanks. This could be a case of mistaken identity, for the riverbanks are home to the Bunyip.
Kilcoy
Kilcoy is a small and unassuming country town in South East Queensland with a population a little over 1000 most of whom are employed servicing the surrounding pastoral area. The residents claim that their major attraction is a large wooden statue of a very well endowed male Yowie. With monotonous regularity, local wags, schoolboys or the morally outraged will come along and emasculate the Yowie statue. Of much more interest to visitors to Kilcoy is the Woodford Folk Festival just 20 km up the road, held each year from December 27 to New Years Day. The festival attracts around 85,000 people (and the occasional Yowie).
Australopithecine?
Yowies may be descendents of Gigantopithecus, a version of robust Australopithecine, or a mega-version of Homo erectus descended from Java Man. Rex Gilroy, the Yowie Man believes the Yowie is of the Gigantopithecus family.
There are many ideas as to what this creature may be, perhaps even a bipedal marsupial.
And some say that the Yowie is a Spirit from the Dreamtime.
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